For years, the music industry has struggled to enforce the copyright on its music. Sites such as Napster came under great attack for distributing music that was under copyright. In recent years, the distribution of music online has become an enormous market. This has had a great impact on the music industry and its profits. As a result, the music industry has battled to stay afloat amidst the hundreds of sites that offer free music. Here is a video that gives a preview of the struggle that the music industry is currently facing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmP64KjRims
Restrictions on Online Music
The music industry has recently made it harder for the public to listen to new music online. For example, Muxtape was a company that made it easy to listen to music online and to share one’s mixes with friends. It did not, however, allow people to download the music. In addition, Muxtape had links to Amazon, enabling people to purchase the music. Recently, Muxtape put a message on its website saying that it will be unavailable for a short time while it sorts out some problems with the Recording Industry Association of America.
Also, recently the government has doubled the “performance-royalty” rate that internet radio stations must pay the record companies to stream their music. The rate that internet radio stations have to pay is twice as much as the one that satellite radio stations have to pay. This new “performance-royalty” rate has threatened to put internet radio stations such as Pandora out of business.
Finally, artists are not putting their music on things such as iTunes in order to discourage people from only purchasing single songs. Instead, they want the public to purchase their entire album. One such example is Warner’s pulling Estelle’s “Shine” album off of iTunes.
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Music Industry and Colleges
Recently, tensions have risen between various colleges and the RIAA in its attempt to fight piracy. For years, colleges have cooperated with the entertainment industry in its attempt to fight piracy. In the last year, however, some colleges have not been so cooperative. Many colleges feel like the entertainment industry is attempting to abuse its power by lobbying to force filtering technology on university networks. In addition, colleges are complaining that they are spending too much time on the notices that the RIAA sends them when infringing content is found on their networks. There are various ways that some colleges have attempted to resist such notices sent by the RIAA.
One way that some colleges have attempted to solve this problem is by erasing network-access logs more often, so that the university cannot track down the identities of those accused of piracy if a month or so has passed. In addition, some universities have stopped forwarding students the prelitigation settlement letters from the RIAA. These letters offer the students accused of piracy the option of settling out of court for several thousand dollars instead of going to court and running the risk of paying more money. Finally, some colleges have attempted to resist the RIAA by arguing that the RIAA’s subpoenas have caused an undue burden on the universities.
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Example of Music Industry Attacking Individuals
There is an ongoing war that has been taking place in regards to copyrights and the internet. For years, companies have been sued for distributing music that is under copyright. In addition, there have been a greater number of individuals being sued for infringing on copyrights than there were in the past. For instance, Stephanie Lenz posted a video on YouTube of her 18-month-old son dancing as the Prince song, Let’s Go Crazy, was playing in the background. After seeing the video that Lenz posted, Universal Music Group told YouTube to remove the video off of their website because it violated copyright laws. In addition, Universal’s lawyers contacted Lenz and informed her that she had willfully infringed on copyrights and was in risk of being fined $150,000.
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Improvements on Restrictions
Recently, the music industry made the decision to drop the DRM usage restrictions on music downloads. The major labels dropped the DRM restrictions in hope that it would increase their sales. This change in policies, however, has not really boosted their sales like they hoped. In order to significantly increase digital music sales, labels and their retail partners must offer more than music free of restrictions. Companies need to do things such as add more features like song lyrics. In addition, they need to become more creative with their pricing because many people have access to free music, which is very difficult to compete with.
Furthermore, the purpose of the DRM-free music was not to increase the sales of iTunes. Instead, this change of policy was made in order to enable companies other than Apple to be able to sell music that is compatible with the iPod. In addition, Amazon has recently made a lot of progress in the digital-music market. Amazon has partnered with companies such as MySpace Music, T-Mobile, and Rockstar Games to increase its market. For instance, MySpace Music, Rockstar Games, and Amazon worked together to allow players of “Grand Theft Auto IV” to tag songs in the game’s soundtrack and later purchase them on Amazon. The dropping of the DRM restrictions has been a major factor in companies’ recent decisions to form such partnerships. If other companies’ songs were not compatible with the iPod, it is unlikely that these partnerships would be as successful. Therefore, the decision to get rid of the DRM restrictions has greatly opened up the digital-music market to companies other than Apple.
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Attempt to Boost Music Production
A rate structure was recently implemented in the US that rewards song writers for their work. Many times, business refused to adequately reward songwriters for their songs. The new structure creates a set rate structure that should create more stability in the digital music industry, boosting its sales. Songwriters can now be confident that they will be rewarded fairly for their works, which will cause them to create more songs. This will result in the music industry having more songs to sell to the public.
It is very important that all sides of the argument come together and find common ground. If they do not do so, it will greatly hurt the digital music industry, which is still trying to take off. By creating more security for songwriters, companies will be able to provide more services for the consumers.
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Obama and McCain’s Views on Copyright and the Music Industry
Both John McCain and Barack Obama took a stand on issues that will have a more direct impact on the digital music market than most others issues. The first issue that will have an impact on the digital music industry is the one concerning radio royalties. The digital music market’s main concern is the effort to impose a performance royalty on terrestrial radio broadcasters. Imposing such a royalty on terrestrial radio broadcasters would help relive some of the financial strains on the music industry, which would in turn help digital retailers license negotiations. Another issue that is of great concern to the digital music industry is the recent performance royalties that were placed on Internet radio. Some companies, such as Pandora, which has become increasingly popular, claim that such performance royalties may put them out of business.
Another political issue that may have an effect on the digital music industry is that of net neutrality. Though the music industry has not taken a side on this issue, McCain and Obama have. McCains’ website reads that he “does not believe in prescriptive regulation like ‘net-neutrality,’” while Obaman’s reads that he “strongly supports the principle of network neutrality to preserve the benefits of open competition on the Internet.” A third issue that is of concern to the music industry is the one of piracy. Both McCain and Obama stated concern for the issue of piracy, but neither one of them has really offered a proposition of how to battle this problem. McCain was, however, more direct in stating that he would fight to crack down on piracy, both on the Internet and off. Finally, the issue of Internet sales tax is one that would affect the digital music industry. By placing an Internet sales tax, the cost of digital music would increase, thus affecting the digital music industry. Though important to the music industry, neither McCain nor Obama directly addressed the issue in their campaigns.
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